PHILADELPHIA — A new day in a new city brought more anguish for the Blue Jackets on Sunday at Wells Fargo Center.
A vexing winless streak that just won't end extended to nine straight games with a 5-2 loss to the Philadelphia Flyers , tying a franchise long skid that's only happened four other times in the Jackets' 22 prior seasons.
"We have better (to give), obviously, and the streak we're on, we have to have a lot better if we want to get out of it," Blue Jackets captain Boone Jenner said.
More: What we learned: Columbus Blue Jackets' skid is ugly, not as bad as it seems
Jenner and Alexandre Texier scored the Columbus goals. Goalie Spencer Martin took the loss after making 21 saves on 25 shots. Joel Farabee , Bobby Brink , Ryan Poehling and Travis Konecny scored the first four goals for the Flyers, whose final goal was scored by Poehling into an empty net.
Samuel Ersson made 19 saves to earn the goaltending win for the Flyers, who won their fifth straight game and improved to 10-7-1. The Blue Jackets lost 4-3 on Saturday in Washington, 22 hours before facing the Flyers, and the loss handed them a 4-11-4 start this season.
"That's game number seven in 11 days, two back-to-backs, so tonight I saw a team that was a little bit fatigued," Blue Jackets coach Pascal Vincent said. "This is where we are now. Adversity is a beautiful challenge, and we've faced some. We're in the trenches with our guys. We're in this together. But I thought tonight, even if the game was close, that it wasn't the same team that I've seen recently."
The game Sunday was most notable for a Blue Jackets player who didn't suit up. Patrik Laine watched as a healthy scratch for the first time in his NHL career, sitting out after his struggles continue to mount coming off a concussion.
Here are three takeaways:
The Blue Jackets officially have a major problem on power plays that demands they find a solution. Costly mistakes have played a big role in their skid reaching nine games, but most of those games went right down the wire without the Jackets getting help from their two power play groups.
Facing an aggressive Flyers penalty kill Sunday, the Blue Jackets went 0 for 5 on power plays and didn't get a single shot on goal. They were outshot 2-0 and outscored 1-0 by Philadelphia's penalty killers during a whopping 8:26 of time with a man-advantage.
"It just has to be better," Jenner said. "That stat of no shots, it's not good enough and it's hurting us. When we need it to get us going, get us some momentum, it's not doing that. We had some zone time, but we have to get some pucks to the net and it falls on us."
Difficulty re-entering the offensive zone after the puck gets cleared is one of the biggest issues. Another is struggling with turnovers when opposing players apply increased puck pressure inside the zone.
The Blue Jackets are just 6 of 61 for the season and rank 30thin the NHL with a 9.8% success rate. They haven't scored a power play goal in their past seven games, going 0 for 20 in that stretch.
Not having Laine normally could be circled as a problem, but that's not currently the case. He's struggling in all areas, including power plays, and the Jackets' woes extend far beyond him. Vincent didn't rule out the possibility of making major changes soon with assistant coach Mark Recchi.
"What do we have to lose, right?" he said. "We will be looking at everything. I don't know if it's minor tweaks or a big change, but we'll be looking at every solution possible."
One thing the Blue Jackets haven't done enough during their slide is muscle up on opposing teams.
They're still one of the youngest teams in the NHL and the roster is dependent on skill players to success, but power forward Mathieu Olivier made a solid observation about the Jackets' skid.
"I think our team's doing a lot of good things in this nine-game stretch we've been losing, but there's maybe too much niceness to our team and a little too much hesitation," he said. "So, we needed to change something up and we need everyone to buy into that. When it comes to that, it's my job to lead and show the way, but at some point, we're going to have to ramp that up because we're doing the rest and it's just not working."
It wasn't their main objective, but the Blue Jackets let Flyers forward Garnet Hathaway know they haven't forgotten about his hit in the season-opener that injured Zach Werenski .
Hathaway delivered a late hit in that game while leading with his right knee and it forced Werenski to leave the game. He also missed the following two games with a severe "Charleyhorse" on his thigh.
Olivier got into a shoving match with Hathaway midway through the second period, right in front of the Flyers' bench. He picked up an additional roughing minor by popping Hathaway in the nose with a gloved punch while a linesman was separating the two.
Olivier also fought Nic Deslauriers in the first period.
"(Hathaway's) hit on Werenski was, for lack of a better word ... it was really, really dirty, Olivier said. "We didn't like that. We're not going to forget that. So, I thought it was important to make a point there. He has Deslauriers doing his dirty work for him. That's on him."
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Blue Jackets drop ninth straight, tie franchise record
